How old do we think these belts are?

Bought my car a year ago. Was told cambelts were replaced 2 years ago. No receipt though.

decided to replace them myself anyway as insurance.

what do we think? Hard to be sure I guess but 2 years old?


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There is a production date code on them. No guessing needed.

They dont really look very old but since they didnt replace the tensioner bearings much of the writing is worn off the back side.

 

Brilliant. I’ll grab the codes when I pop them off. Is it a date printed on there or does it need decoding?

 

Its a long number. 1st 4 digits are week and year.

 

Lots of threads on how to do this yourself. If you are going to restore stock Cam timing, its not that hard. If you are going put in advanced timing, do your homework and make sure you have the tools (see my thread on camshaft timing with photos). Also, if you are going to do the belts, you should do the tensioner bearing while you are in there. I always swap those together (belts and tensioner bearing)

 

Even if the belts were replaced two years ago, the question is how many miles did it run in two years?

 

It’s done 3000 miles since the change (mostly me). I just didn’t like the uncertainty so decided to swap them. Have new tensioner bearings from Superformance. Nice looking items, not split inner races.

just machining up my cam lock tool today. If it’s not been done before I’ll pop the drawing up as a PDF if it’s useful for main dimensions.

 

I’ve also heard belts are a good time to do water pump?

 

Whats wrong with split inner races?
I have no idea what bearings Superformance sells (in over 40 years I have never once used them as a source for anything) but there are a lot of junk earings being sold.

 

If you want to throw unneeded parts at the car its a good time for a new set of tires and a clutch too.

 

With good reason!!

The bearings on mine are knackered. Nice to be back working on a car that you can buy parts to rebuild a water pump.

cam lock done. Time to change some belts.
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Hi.

Nothing in general but was using the Birdman page and had read the ones with split inner races can come apart on careless installation.

 

Those were the best bearings we ever had available to us and they were very reasonable price. Some people maybe just should stick to what they know.

 

Japanese IJK bearings. One of the ones that came off was a little worn.

Belts were Ferrari branded. only number I can see I think is 107833/2 but it’s very worn. Surely not Oct 1978.

Either way. Glad I chose to do this now. Peace of mind for £100 worth of parts.
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It all depends.

Replacing the water pump every belt change (based on a 3~5 year belt change) would be excessive and more often than not, unnecessary.

The belt service is a great time to check the condition of the water pump, to see if it feels stiff/lumpy, if it's leaking, or not right in any way shape or form, because you're in that area anyway.

If you buy a 308/328 (or a 348/355), and you have no idea how old the water pump is, with no record of when or if it has ever been changed, or if the records show that the water pump was replaced a couple of decades ago, then I'd say,at the very least check the water pump whilst carrying out a belt service, and for total peace of mind, replace the water pump, and then you shouldn't really need to worry about it for at least another 4 belt services at least.

 

Should be shown on your invoice - that is the correct part no for the official item

 

Thats a part number. Not a date code. There are a few other numbers on it.

 

Ah, ok. There’s almost nothing left on the front belt (the rear has no markings left at all). They don’t look too old so maybe they were done as previous owner said. Worth doing to swap the tensioner bearings.

thanks for all the advice. I served my time on Fiats & Lancias many many years ago but Ferraris are new to me so it’s back to school!
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Now you found the name and part number.

 

Replace a water pump at a belt change?

It's not like water pumps fail regularly at a few thousand miles...or even many, MANY thousands of miles if the cooling system is reasonably maintained and there is either antifreeze or water pump lubricant in the coolant. Normally if they fail they begin weeping coolant from the weep hole (which is why it is there) giving plenty of warning that you need to rebuild/replace the pump. The pumps themselves are not "service items." They typically last the life of the car. I would not replace one unless it showed signs of needing it - weeping coolant, noisy bearings. Usually the coolant weep is first, followed eventually by noisy bearings. They can weep for a LOOONG time with no adverse affect on engine cooling as long as the coolant level is maintained.

OTOH, a bearing failure prior to any weeping can occur if the WP belt(s) is too tight. An excessively tight belt puts too much side-load on the bearings and is the typical cause of premature WP bearing failure...or alternator bearing failure for that matter.

 

Early 308s had junk pumps. Repair shops took advantage and created a fear of pump failure. There have been about 7 or 8 factory updates and a few aftermarket options. Except for a few poor quality rebuilders and a few poorly built after market pumps factory pumps have been good for a very long time but thanks to the internet the fear persists. Mine has been in the car for 12 years and I don't even think about it.

 

Still running the original wp on my 85 QV. 33k miles. So, 1 of 1 that must have been assembled right.

 

One of the reasons I took mine apart was a bearing rumble. Alternator belt was crazy tight. It had taken out the inner pump bearing.

Easy job to rebuild the pump but as I’m discovering getting the parts sometimes takes a couple of goes. Had to re order the inner seals to the ones listed as later QV seals even though mine is a 2V.

 

May be one already uploaded, but in case not and its useful, here are the dimensions for a 2V cam lock tool

 

Never had need for one but thanks.